1. Lenny Kravitz "Fly Away"
Lenny's rhythmic guitar along with his hopes of freedom combine in a soulful ballad. Hearing "Fly Away" conjures up visions of a young Ricky Bobby who just wanted to go fast. Plus, it's Lenny. This is the same guy who, super model Adriana Lima pretended to be engaged to, even buying herself a diamond ring to make her charade more convincing. That same kind of animal magnetism has been drawing listeners to his music since his years as a kid in the Upper East Side.
2. Public Enemy "Harder Than You Think"
Public Enemy rewrote the book on Hip-Hop in the 80's. Some have compared this stacked rap group to "The Dream Team". I'd say that's not taking it far enough. I mean come on, Flavor Flav, Chuck D, Professor Griff, and S1W. Sure there were claims that they were Palestinian sympathizers and sure, they allegedly had a side rap-rock group called "Confrontation Camp". But can we believe all of this? (It's on Wikipedia, so the answer is DEFINITELY.) Anyways, what's not to love about visionaries and little bit of controversy? Public Enemy drops so many rhymes in this soulful anthem it makes Will Smith blush all the way in Bel Aire.
3. Blues Traveler "Run-Around"
Psychedelic Southern Rock, as some would classify Blues Traveler, is a combination of two musical concepts that would seem to mix like toothpaste and orange juice. Somehow, Blues Traveler dual wields these two to perfection. I hate running, but this song makes me want to actually run around. They say that a good song is something you can be driving in your car listening to, and not want to get where you are going. It makes you simply want to disappear into the vector of time and space and all sense of responsibility merely melts away. I don't think that has ever happened to me, and to be honest, that sounds a little sketchy, like acid or something, but this song brings me pretty close to that, what I would imagine as, euphoric state of mind.
4. U2 "Beautiful Day"
I can't count the number of times that I have steering wheel drummed the stew out of this song. This song has actually been banned while driving in the suburbs of Berlin, Germany because it caused more wrecks than texting while driving. So I say, "listen responsibly" and also, "don't text and drive".
5. The Verve "Bittersweet Symphony"
It's true what they say. Life is a bittersweet symphony. Now I'm not exactly sure what that means, like do I have to be a maestro to understand this song? That issue aside, I am a sucker for the violin and the video has over 22 million views and it was released in 1997. I don't even think Al Gore had invented the Internet yet at this point. So how the stew did it get so many views? Seriously, the music video is the same as every single other music video in existence. Some dude walking down the street looking into a camera and singing... It must be because the song is so dang good.
Listen Responsibly,
G-Money
